The 7 Laws of Scaling with Jim Huffman

Are you starting an agency?  Don't miss these tips from an agency owner that's built a 7 figure business. Jim talks about the following:

• What your agency should focus on
• Why you should niche down right away
• How to price your services
• How to manage your client communication
• Why you should focus on recurring work vs. project based work
• The key to great work is in the onboarding 

RESOURCES:

• Jim Huffman website
• Jim's Twitter
• GrowthHit
• The Growth Marketer's Playbook

Do you have a company that runs itself?  Learn how Chris was able to bootstrap his business to 8 figures. Then hear the steps he took to build a board of directors and to hire a professional CEO.  Finally, Chris provides insights on how he invests his time and money in e-commerce and real estate. 

RESOURCES:

• Jim Huffman website
• Jim's Twitter
• GrowthHit
• The Growth Marketer's Playbook

Jim breaks down how he had zero innovative ideas while building a 7 figure business. He talks about how he stole every single idea along the way and he gives credit to where those ideas came from. 

From jumping on the trend of "Growth Hacking" that was invented by Sean Ellis to stealing his long term vision of micro acquisition from Andrew Wilkerson at Meta Labs, Jim gives credit to all the companies and founders that innovated before him.

Finally, hear about the 1 thing that actually matters to make all of this happen. 

RESOURCES:

• The Non-Visionary CEO on How to Steal Ideas (Blog post)
• Jim Huffman website
• Jim's Twitter
• GrowthHit
• The Growth Marketer's Playbook

Listen in to today’s episode to hear Andrew Gazdeki discuss the startup opportunities that get the most demand, how he has grown MicroAcquire, and the impact journaling has had on his career.

Topics Discussed in Today’s Episode:

• Andrew’s background
• A summary of what MicroAcquire is
• What Andrew is seeing as far as the type of opportunities that get the most demand
• How to think about founder/company fit
• How to measure traction in a product market
• MicroAcquire’s buyer pool
• The growth of MicroAcquire
• Annual subscriptions
• Community as a channel
• MicroAcquire’s community group on Facebook
• How Andrew grew a company and sold it
• Why Andrew was interested in micro acquisitions
• What Andrew is excited about right now
• The impact journaling has had on Andrew
• The nicest thing anyone has done for Andrew professionally

Resources:

• Andrew Gazdecki
• Andrew on Twitter
• MicroAcquire
• TED Talk
• Jim Huffman website
• Jim's Twitter
• GrowthHit
• The Growth Marketer's Playbook

As a founder, what do you do on the days when the sky is falling? 

When times get tough I change my mindset to be proactive rather than reactive.  While bad things happen to you, you still control your actions and your perspective.  I start playing offense.

I list out all the momentum we have at the company.  Then I identify the positive things I can control. Hear about the framework I use to get my mind on the right track.

RESOURCES:

• Playing Offense: A Mental Model for Founders
• Jim Huffman website
• Jim's Twitter
• GrowthHit
• The Growth Marketer's Playbook

This episode features Ryan Hamilton, a standup comedian that's toured with Jerry Seinfeld, starred in his own Netflix's special and been on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallow and The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.  Learn about his writing process and how we went from PR to comedian. Here are some highlights:

• What he learned touring with Jerry Seinfeld
• How he went from PR to being a full time standup comedian in NYC
• Ryan's process for writing a joke
• Advice he would give to any young comedian starting out
• Ryan's half-baked startup ideas he would start today

RESOURCES:

• Ryan Hamilton Website
• Ryan Hamilton Instagram 
• Happy Face on Netflix
• Comedy Cellar
• Jim Huffman website
• Jim's Twitter
• GrowthHit
• The Growth Marketer's Playbook

Here are the 20 tools I use to run my seven figure business. You can have the same tech stack for under $500. 

ONE MAN SALES MACHINE

1. Typeform - Free / $20
2. Calendly - Free / $20
3. Pipedrive - $19
4. Zapier - Free
5. SuperHuman - $30
6. Bonsai - $19
7. QuickBooks / PayPal

MARKETING

1. MailShake -$59 / month
2. Campaign Monitor - $80 month
3. JustUno
4. UpWork - design for content upgrades, building outreach database for partnership or potential leads

PROJECT MGMT TECH STACK

1. Slack [Free]
2. Zoom [Free] - $19 
3. Asana [Paid] - $11 per user
4. G Suite [Paid]
5. Report Garden / Google Data Studio - $89

CLIENT TOOLS

1. Google Optimize
2. Ads Manager
3. Research Tools (SEMRush, SimilarWeb, SpyFu)
4. MailCharts 

Resources:

• Jim Huffman blog
• Twitter
• GrowthHit
• The Growth Marketer's Playbook

What does an executive coach do for their clients? You’ll learn more about that from today’s interview with Rick Maguire. Rick has a fascinating backstory, as he was a former Naval Officer who then became a Microsoft executive before becoming an executive coach. Listen in to learn how his Navy background translated in the rest of his career, what benefits his clients receive from coaching, and what kind of mistakes Rick sees in the course of his work. 

Topics Discussed in Today’s Episode:

• Rick’s ideal client
• The main benefits that Rick’s clients walk away with
• What Rick’s Navy experience was like and how it translated to the rest of his career
• The time period when Rick was at Microsoft and what the transition was like
• What people get excited about when scaling up
• How to figure out where to start
• Common mistakes Rick sees
• Where the leader’s time should be spent
• Half-baked ideas
• How to get in touch with Rick

Resources:

• Rick Maguire
• Futurity Resources
• Futurity on Twitter
• Jim Huffman blog
• Twitter
• GrowthHit

After working with startups for 10 years, I’m getting into the check writing game.  Here is why I'm doing angel investing:

• What is Angel investing? 
• My investment advantage: Not the market, not real estate, startups?
• Why I like Bala Nursing Shoes:
  • Riches in Niches
  • Product is a Painkiller (and not a vitamin)
  • Not marketing to everyone (Know their persona)
  • Proactive buyer (not passive)
  • Community with high referral potential
  • High AOV
  • High Repeat purchase (surprisingly, this one is better than I thought)
  • Validated a Product
  • Growth w/ no Ads
  • A+ team
• My Concerns:
  • Product Quality: The first 10,000 pairs of shoes arrive from China during a pandemic. They have been unable to have their own people on the ground to inspect the shoes. 
  • New Brand: Bala is doing everything for the first time and they have no trust from customers. Plus, they’re going head to head against big brands with big budgets.
  • P&L Concerns: On average, the shoe industry has a high return rate of 20%. How will these guys fair? This business is very heavy on working capital and mismanagement of cash flows can kill growth and a business.
  • Consumer Growth: Can they diversify their audience from the NurseLifeRN partnership and find scalable channels that are ROI positive? Repeatable and scalable growth only gets more and more expensive as companies get bigger.
  • Team: This team has no startup experience. Can they handle “the unknown unknowns” while working in a remote world? We shall see.

Resources:

• Why I'm Investing $25k in this Startup
• Bala Shoes
• Jim Huffman blog
• Twitter
• GrowthHit

What startup would you start today?  Yonathan Ayenew, COO of GrowthHit, brainstorms some half-baked startup ideas he would launch if he was starting today. In this episode we cover the following startup ideas:

• Our framework for vetting starting ideas
• The "Roll Up" Business Model
• When to buy vs. when to build a startup
• Startup ideas around exclusive inventory 
• Humans replaced by AI
• Why were hesitant on Ecommerce 
• Productized services and more

RESOURCES:

• Peleton
• Copy.ai
• 99Designs
• Jim Huffman blog
• Twitter
• GrowthHit
• The Growth Marketer's Playbook